Last week Terry Lynn and I attended a National Park Service C&O Canal Volunteer Appreciation event at Glen Echo. (I am a volunteer with the Canal Classroom Corps.) We enjoyed the delicious catered dinner. Attendees were encouraged to bring a dessert. Attendees could then vote for their favorite dinner. Terry Lynn and I made desserts with insect ingredients. More about that later.
Around 1956 my family went to Glen Echo. It was the King’ Dominion or Six Flags of it’s Day. I was terrified/traumatized by the roller coaster, and don’t like them to this day. I loved the bumper cars. (I think that prepared me for riding with my sweet wife.) Sadly, little is left of the amusement park. The carousel is still there and many of the buildings. It is now an artsy community. The Park Service has a nice visitor center with stories and photos from the glory days. You can see more photos of Glen Echo here.
I was surprised to read Glen Echo was the site of an early race riot– 1966. The amusement park usually didn’t allow Blacks. On the day it was open to Blacks, the rides “suspiciously” were not working, and a riot broke out.
Back to the desserts– Terry Lynn made brownies with EntomoFarms cricket flour. I made Bug La VA (as in baklava, but with my own “farm raised” mealworms, originally from Rainbow Mealworm.) Sadly, neither dessert won the contest, but I did hear positive reviews from folks who tried it. And I got to tell some folks where they could purchase insect protein ingredients. (Here’s a list.)
Some folks might recognize the health benefits and the benefits for our environment by moving toward insect protein. But they just can’t yet “stomach” eating bugs. Fear not! Their are R&D folks pioneering in marketing black soldier fly larva, and feeding those larva to fish, chickens and pigs. Here is a video. Enterra is a hatchery in Vancouver. They posted this video. Beef can produce less than 200 lbs. of protein on an acre. The larvae can produce 1 or 2 million lbs. Innovafeed claims 1 insect protein factory could keep 25,000 lbs of CO2 out of the atmosphere– that’s like taking 14,000 cars off the highway. Read more here. Be sure to check out the info graphic.
Ento Treats 